Dive Brief:
- Tennessee has launched an advertising blitz with billboards, commercials, and postcards encouraging adults to go back to school, touting the good example they could set for their children as part of a $1 million statewide initiative.
- The Tennessean reports the Reconnect and Complete Program will target 110,000 people who have gone to college at some point in the last 9 years and got at least halfway to completing their degrees.
- The program is part of Gov. Bill Haslam’s push to make 55% of the state population college educated by 2025, a goal in which he says individual colleges and universities must play a pivotal role.
Dive Insight:
College and university recruitment efforts have contributed to Tennessee’s increasing degree attainment statistics. The Tennessean reports Middle Tennessee State University has been particularly aggressive in developing programs and outreach efforts geared toward returning adults.
The Tennessee Promise program, of course, has also attempted to increase the college educated population in the state. In its first year, thousands more high school graduates flocked to the state’s community colleges. Nationwide, Oregon has followed suit with a similar program of its own, and other states are considering them. The City of Chicago has an established promise program in its two-year colleges, and a number of communities across the country have moved ahead with their own in advance of state or federal programs.